Never Been So Bright
by EightofSwords
Summary: One-shot. Short vignette including a youma, Sailor Moon, and Tuxedo Mask. Short and slightly sappy. Revealing anything more would give away the story.


Disclaimer: I do not own Sailor Moon. If I did, I would be out at the mall buying sapphires and designer jeans with all the money it earned me, not sitting around writing fanfiction.

Never Been So Bright

Another night. Another fight.

Ha. That rhymes. At any other time, I would have squealed in appreciation of my poetic abilities, but right now – well, it was the middle of the night, and I was in the middle of a fight. I couldn't even summon the energy to smile, I was so exhausted. When Serena "The Cheshire Cat" Tsukino can't smile, that's when you know things can't get any worse.

That was when a knife hit me.

My eyes bulged; I fell to my knees on the cloth restaurant canopy I'd jumped onto a moment before to dodge the youma's cutlery projectiles. It hadn't been a successful dodge, obviously.

"Oh God…" I breathed out, letting out a tight whisper as I tugged the knife out of my arm with my clumsy left hand. It wasn't as deep as the slash Rei had sustained that time we fought the wannabe ninja youma under Nephlite, but I still averted my eyes as I did so, watching the youma instead. Thank God, it had stopped for a minute. Something had distracted it, and it had turned around and was sniffing the air.

The knife finally emerged completely from my flesh and clattered dully to the sidewalk ten feet below me. Immediately, warmth gushed down my arm and soaked my skirt my arm, pooling around my feet on the canopy. I averted my eyes once more, to avoid the sight, and scoured the dark heavens. My eyes widened when I could not find the moon; it must have retreated behind that mountain of bruised black clouds to hide from the youma.

That was when the gravity of the situation hit me, like a blow to the stomach from one of my brother's baseball bats. It was one o'clock at night, I was out in the park with a youma that was throwing knives, my arm was sporting a slice at least two inches deep, and there would be no Sailor Scouts coming to help me …

Flashback

"Serena, don't you have homework to do?"

"Oh, later, Luna," I giggled and turned the page in my Kare Kano comic book. Arima was so cute… "Stop being such a nag."

Luna heaved a huge sigh. "Your mother won't be very happy if you fail your math test...again."

I shifted uncomfortably on my stomach. I was sprawled on bed, reading manga in the dim light of the setting sun that streamed in through my bedroom window. "Aw, I'll do fine, Luna. Don't you think I'm smart enough to pass a test on adding fractions?"

"No," was Luna's simple reply.

"YOU!" I leapt up and lunged at the infuriating little furball. However, something went wrong: my foot caught in a wrinkle of my bedspread – don't ask me how I could get my foot caught ona wrinkle, I don't know how these things happen either – and I saw the floor looming up before my eyeballs.

"SERENA, WATCH OUT!" I belatedly heard Luna shriek. However, it was too late. My poor, chronically abused body impacted with the floor with a bone-jarring THUNK. I heard and felt something crunching under my kneecap.

"Ow…what's this?" I massaged my quickly swelling forehead and sat up, lifting the object.

"Your communicator!" Luna yowled, batting the device from my palm. It was more pancake than palm pilot now, smushed with wires hanging out of it sides like colored spaghetti noodles. It must have slipped out of my pocket when I fell "SERENA! HOW COULD YOU?"

I rubbed my neck and laughed sheepishly. "Uh…well, it's not that hard, see you fall like this, and – "

"Oh, shut up," ordered Luna. She gave me the nastiest glare she could muster. "I'm going to Central Control to see if I can fix this…" she marched off, mumbling self-righteously about sailor scouts who had moon rocks for brains.

I sat on the floor and watched her go, frowning as I pieced the meaning of her words together. Before indignance could spring up in me, however, I felt a heat on my chest. I looked down to see that my brooch was glowing. I hurried to the window, calling out my transformation words as I went, and jumped to the ground as my clothes melted away and my sailo fuku materialized around me. I was off like a shot, ripping off my goggles and peering into them. I saw a youma hurling knives right and left. The scene behind her was familiar: a glistening lake surrounded by shady trees and yellow benches. The park.

I replaced the goggles on my face and reached into my pocket for my communicator to call the scouts. My seeking fingers found nothing, however, and I remembered with a groan that Luna had my communicator, which was useless anyway.

End of Flashback

I couldn't call my friends. They wouldn't be here to save my sorry rear end this time. Luna wasn't here to give me a pep-talk, either. Even the moon was gone, hidden by clouds.

I was all alone.

"Where are your friends, Sailor Brat?" I tumbled from the canopy as a fresh barrage of knives shot at me, clutching my arm close to my chest as I did so. Maybe my bow could staunch the blood.

"That's a good question," murmured a voice right beside my ear. Whirling around in elation, lightheaded from my loss of blood, I whispered,

"Tuxedo Mask!"

He flashed me a soft smile before hurling a wall of roses at the youma's new attack. All of the knives rained down to the cement sidewalk, each one perfectly countered by a steel-tipped rose. A few were even left over; they bulleted toward the youma with single-minded speed.

"Let me see your arm," he said then, turning to me whiel the youma was distracted. "How bad is it?"

"Not very." I hid my arm away, sidestepping him and scrabbling at my forehead for my tiara. It was awkward, having to use my left hand, but I eventually managed it. I hefted the now-glowing disc, struggling not to drop it.

"Moon…whoah!" It slid from my fingertips, on my right side where I couldn't catch it. I had never dropped my tiara before. What would it do? "Oh no!"

A gloved hand reached past me, accidentally tangling in my ponytails in its haste. It closed around the disc.

"Here." Tuxedo Mask handed the disc back to me.

I gaped at him, stunned. How had he caught my tiara without being…like, burned to a crisp or something? This confusion was suddenly shoved aside as another realization hit me: his gloved fingers were still tangled in my hair; he was unconsciously stroking it, and I was unthinkingly leaning toward him.

"Mushy moment over!" screamed the youma, finally jumping clear of the last rose. Our "mushy moment" had lasted only a handful of seconds.

We both blushed a fiery red, Tuxedo Mask's hand dropping from my hair as though it were fire, and me hastily taking a step away from him. I slipped in the blood that must have been dripping from my arm to the sidewalk – funny, I had forgotten all about my injury – and shrieked as I fell backwards.

But Tuxedo Mask was there, of course, his arms catching me under the arms and righting me before I could make the sidewalk's acquaintance. His arms didn't leave my shoulders even once I was securely upright. I closed my eyes, savoring the warm feeling that flooded my veins like molten gold. A bright light flashed through my eyelids, and I opened my eyes to see my tiara pulsing with a steady golden light. This reminded me of the youma, so I cast it towards the youma with her left hand.

It was a rotten throw, one of my worst ever. The youma stepped to the side, easily avoiding the weapon and smirking. "That's the best you've got, blondie?!"

However, true to the clichéd phrase, "Good always triumphs in the end," the disc, upon swerving around to boomerang back to me, sliced right through the youma as though it were made of butter.

My shoulder drooped with relief. I snagged my tiara as it floated back to me, wearily shoving it back under my bangs. I turned to Tuxedo Mask. I was slightly surprised that he hadn't already disappeared like he usually does, but wasn't about to complain either. "Thank you, Tuxedo Mask."

"Anytime," he said, gazing down at me. I noticed his top hat was nowhere to be seen, revealing his shock of blue-black hair. "Where are your friends?"

"Not here," I murmured. I didn't feel like explaining my whole tripping on my humiliating bedspread fiasco; it wasn't exactly the sort of thing you told your crush about.

My arm gave a throb; my fingers tightened around it. He noticed.

"Lemme see it."

I relinquished my arm to him. His fingers danced nimbly across the slash, my blood staining the tips of his immaculate gloves. Goosebumps followed his fingers' steps, like children summoned by the Pied Piper. His touch was so light, like grass tips tickling your bare feet.

Needless to say, my jaw dropped – yet again – when he tore off his glove with his teeth and touched his bare hand to my arm. Incredibly, impossibly, my skin sealed back up with nary a scar to reveal that I was in a fight, though the blood still remained.

"No way," I breathed, staring at my arm, then up at him. "How'd you do that?"

A smile touched his lips. "It's a secret."

My lips quirked upward in a similar expression. "Fine, be that way." Suddenly feeling very bold, I bounced up on my tiptoes – even in high-heeled boots, I was horribly short – and wrapped my arms around his neck in a quick hug and gave him a peck on the cheek. "Thank you."

I was about to unknot my arms from their extremely comfortable position – my cheeks flushed, my heart pounded, I wondered if maybe he was going to hate me for being so forward – when arms wrapped around my waist. A chin dropped down on my head, between my odangoes, and warm breath gusted down and caressed my hair.

I left my arms where they were. We stood there, entangled like roses on a trellis, for – for I don't know how long. It could have been an eternity, or at least that was what it felt like – before I suddenly noticed his black hair had gleams of silver peeking out where there was usually blue. I glanced up from where my head was resting against his chest, and saw a full moon hanging the sky. The clouds had vanished.

The moonlight had never been so bright.

* * *

A/N: Good? Bad? Boring? What do you think? I kind of just flowed with this one – it was ten-thirty, and I didn't wanna surrender to sleep yet, since that just meant my five o'clock wake-up call for school would come that much sooner – so it's not great literature, obviously. No plot, no character development, and only a little bit of romance, if you could call it that – but enough of me flaming my own story! Press the review button and give me your opinion! 


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